Barclays is on course to break JP Morgan’s six-quarter stranglehold on the global debt capital markets league table and claim the top bookrunner spot in the first quarter of 2014.

Data from investment banking research provider Dealogic shows that JP Morgan has consistently topped the bookrunner rankings every quarter since the second quarter of 2012. In that quarter, it was eclipsed by Barclays, and a similar outcome is on the cards for the first three months of this year.

Preliminary first-quarter Dealogic rankings show that Barclays has worked on 316 deals worth $105.1 billion, giving the UK bank a 7% share of the underwriting market so far. Not since its 7.5% market share in the first quarter of 2011 has the UK bank secured such a large portion of bond issuance.

JP Morgan has slipped to second place, after underwriting $103 billion across 387 deals in the first quarter, and has a 6.8% share of the market globally. The two banks hold a sizeable lead over rivals, with Citigroup ranked third among debt bookrunners globally with a 6.2% share and $93.2 billion of league table credit.

Barclays’ market share has risen from 6.4% in the first quarter last year, when JP Morgan held a 7.7% share.

One of the cornerstones of the UK bank’s success in the first quarter has been its work in the sovereign, supranational and agency sector, where only HSBC with an 8% market share came close to Barclays’ 9.5% slice of activity in the first quarter.

Jonathan Brown, Barclays’ head of European fixed income syndicate, said: “On the frequent borrower front, which is the bedrock of debt business, we have reaped the benefits of having a stable team in place for a couple of years. With sovereigns, we enjoyed some success in tackling the challenge of bringing some returning peripheral issuers, Ireland, Spain, Portugal and Italy, successfully back to the market in the first quarter last year, and we are pleased that they asked us again to help them back to the markets at the start of this year too.”

JP Morgan declined to comment.

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Among more than a dozen sovereign deals on which Barclays has worked in the first quarter were a €3.75 billion Irish 10-year bond, a €3.25 billion deal for Portugal and a €10 billion 10-year issue for Spain, all of which were launched in January. More recently the bank worked on an Italian €4.5 billion 10-year bond and is one of the joint bookrunners on the European Investment Bank’s climate awareness benchmark bond, which is in the market this week.

Brown said: “SSA business has been exceptional for us in Q1, and since that sector paused for breath a couple of weeks ago, we have seen more corporate and hybrid business.”

Barclays’ work in the hybrid debt sector includes deals this month for Spain’s Telefonica as well as German utility EnBW and car maker Volkswagen, while on the corporate front the bank was a passive bookrunner on Exxon Mobil's $5.5 billion issue and had a role on the $8 billion transaction for US technology company Cisco Systems last month - the two were among the three biggest bond offerings in the first quarter globally, according to Dealogic.

Mark Lewellen, Barclays’ head of Emea debt capital markets, said: “We have had a good run on the SSA side, where issuance tends to be front-loaded to the early part of the year. We have also seen a pick-up in corporate activity, with a focus on hybrid capital, and we expect more to come on that front.”